Western democracies gave an enthusiastic reception to the new order in Russia--so much so that our Ambassador in Petrograd, of all men the most innocent and above suspicion, was accused of complicity in the revolutionary plot. Liberals spoke of the awakening of Russia, and they were absolutely right. It was, indeed, an awakening of oppressed, exploited people, and was thorough, abrupt and rude. Officials in Paris and London were not without misgivings, but they perceived some advantages in the situation--a central soviet at Petrograd, or even a Republic, ruled by idealists, would be a more docile instrument than the Government of the Czar. Superficially, they were right. This shortsighted view was justified by events during the first four months of confusion and excitement. Fundamentally, they were wrong. They had misjudged the Revolution, and had not recognized that lassitude and exasperation pervaded the Russian armies, and that men in this frame of mind were better left alone. The fate of Rumania had trembled in the balance when left to the tender mercies of the men who ruled in Russia under the old régime. The Revolution had brought a chance of respite, and admitted a ray of hope. Great Britain and France could have helped the Rumanian people by using their influence to insist on strict adherence to the terms of the Military Convention. If this had been done, and if patience and foresight had been exercised, the natural desire of the Army and the Government, to take an active part in the reconquest of their territory, might have been gratified on sane strategic lines. The Rumanian Army might have been reorganized and re-equipped, and then could have played a useful part in a concerted Allied plan. This was not to be. The Allied plan was fixed and immutable. Though everything had changed in Russia, this plan was the direct outcome of Gourko’s fantasies: it consisted in a gigantic offensive operation, without adequate communications and with ill-equipped armies, on more than one hundred miles of front. The Rumanian forces were to be wedged between two Russian armies and thus deprived of the power of independent movement, while their rôle was limited to that of an insignificant fraction of an incoherent mass. Ignorance and optimism ruled the Allied Councils; they were to be as fatal to Rumanian interests as Russian guile and greed. I returned to Jassy from Petrograd towards the middle of March. The Russian forces in Moldavia had caught the revolutionary infection; their Commander-in-Chief, a Russian prince, had found prudence to be the better part of valour and assisted at committee meetings wearing a red cockade. Revolution softens the manners and customs of even the most violent natures. Officers, who a few months before had kicked their soldiers in the streets for not saluting, now, when they got a rare salute, returned it with gratitude.